Travel by Pullman: A Century of Service, 1865-1969 | Joe Welsh, Bill Howes

Travel by Pullman: A Century of Service, 1865-1969 | Joe Welsh, Bill Howes | A Historical Re-write?

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Travel by Pullman:...

	Travel by Pullman: A Century of Service, 1865-1969 Joe Welsh, Bill Howes MBI, 2004 - 160 pages average customer review:based on 3 reviews view larger image
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Every evening for much of the twentieth century, 50,000 or more travelers snuggled under crisp Pullman linens, falling asleep in one state and awaking in another. This nostalgic look back at what was essentially a rolling hotel company contracted by the nation's railroads to provide guest accommodations, covers every aspect of Pullman operations, from the emerging popularity of steam-powered rail travel in the early twentieth century to its diesel-powered zenith and its eventual nadir in the 1950s and 1960s. Pullman's entire complex network of employees and services is featured, from the ticket offices that manually handled millions of reservations each year to the six car shops spread across the nation to perform heavy maintenance and repairs, and all of Pullman's porters, mechanics, cleaners, electricians, cooks, barbers, shoeshiners, and more. Illustrated with both black-and-white and color period views depicting Pullman interiors and facilities, as well as memorabilia and sales literature.

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Excellent Presentation of Pullman Service

This is a wonderful book! Very thorough, excellent photos/graphics, well written text. Absolutely a must for anyone interested in overnight train travel; what it was, and what it could be.

A Historical Re-write?

Although this book has some interesting photos and a bare bones history of the Pullman Car phenomenon, it is truly deficit in any mention and documentation of the Pullman Porters. How can a history of any sort be written about the Pullmans without talking about these hardworking porters and their service, which, by the way, sold the seats? In fact, much photographic documentation of these men exists, as Pullman used many photos of them in the corporate image advertising and some exists also from the porters' own historic unionization efforts. The fact that there is not a reference in even the index, and that less than a handful of pictures including these men can be seen in these pages makes me wonder about the author's grip on the material. After all, the berths did not lower and make themselves! For me, this book represents a simplification and sanitation of some very important American history.

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Operational excellence

Interesting book and although factual description of Pullman travel. The Pullman car would not have been sucessful with out the Pullman porter.This book seems to imply that service in the cars was provided by the entire train crew while in fact the train was sucessful only because of the porters. A blunder on the part of the author.

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